Pissed off over photos

[ChubbyBoobs456]

DD's first birthday today. No one could be bothered to take a good photo of me. I have a handful of photos, either me talking, or in just a terrible pose, DD crying, DD not looking at camera. Not for lack of effort from my side, I tried but no one had the patience to take a good one. Fuck sake. I made an effort with everyone. Everyone has at least one excellent shot. Not me. It's ruined my night. I'm not normally this self centred but I literally gave birth to this human a year ago. I don't know why it's made me feel so ugly and unappreciated.

I am now refusing to send out photos. And I have deleted the best ones (not best ones of DD, but some excellent ones of other people). If they want photos, they can take it themselves.

I am indeed a mother, and I would like my children to have lots of photos of me to look back on, especially ones that show me enjoying my time with them. I would also like them to know that someone else loved me and them enough to make sure they had that.

It’s exactly this.

Your posts are coming across as dramatic and tantrum-y, OP. But there is a tendency for mums (and other women in a family) to make more of an effort to capture photos and not ending up in enough of them as a result. It's frustrating.

Stop deleting photos or refusing to send anyone photos of them with your DD - all you're doing is chipping away at/dishonoring their relationship with your DD, and more than anything that's not fair to DD.

Keep asking people to take pictures of you and DD (and talk to your partner if you have one and/or parents if they're very close about how important it is to you). But stop holding out for the perfect photo of either you or DD and just embrace the reality that pics where DD is squirming away or distracted or you're "in-action" doing three things at once are part of capturing this stage of life.

My best tip for babies/toddlers though is to turn your phone on video mode and then have people pretend to take pictures for DD's sake (and if they have an iphone they can do pics while videoing). Then you can go through the videos and look for the perfect still frame to crop.

If you care, you take pics.

Oh my goodness we live in a warped world if people really judge whether someone cares about them by whether they take a photo of them or not.

Can you really not remember people or places or events unless you have photographic evidence?

Modern technology is fast destroying the brain's wonderful ability to do many things and it's creating generations who apparently have no ability to hold memories in their heads .

People took photos, they just weren't up to OPs standards.

Op it sounds like you feel undervalued and guests/ partner not bothering to get a nice shot of you is proof of this for you.I totally get your response in that case. It annoys me that I have to ask my DH to take a photo of me when I have so many I have taken of him with the children as they have grown up. I wonder if you communicated this clearly on the day though? If not wait until you are calm and really spell out how important this is to you and what you would like to happen in the future.

Also I have literally NO photos of me and my mother except 1 when I am 16.It does matter!

@Theringcycle

I would also like them to know that someone else loved me and them enough to make sure they had that.

In all honesty do you think if your children look at a photo of them and you together they actually think " oh somebody must have loved us to take this photo " ???

The view being expressed on this thread by some pp that taking a photo of someone is a symbol of caring, and , conversely not taking a photo is a sign people don't care about you is just so strange. I've never heard of people talk in these terms. I know some people are obsessive photo takers but I never realised it had such emotional symbolism for them. Really quite an eye opener to me. A totally different world.

Oh, for God's sake! Grow up!

@ChubbyBoobs456 have a read of the Zawn article I’ve linked above, if you can - it expresses and analyses this really well, and the responses you’re receiving are pretty much playing out what the article says. Wanting the photographs to reflect the reality of who is in your child’s life is a perfectly understandable feeling, and it’s a shame that some people think it’s doing a disservice to your daughter for you not to circulate the photos of others with her but it’s apparently totally fine for her not to have many pictures of you.

I read in the OP that there was only a handful of her hence my reference to her not having many pictures. If there were more than a handful then there may well have been more of a chance of one that the OP liked.

A real shame - agree it does matter! Similar for me as I am sufficiently ancient to have grown up pre-digital; we are fortunate to live in a time when photos can be taken in abundance rather than limited to a camera film.

So there were photos of you and DD, you just didn't like them. If baby was being passed from person to person for the perfect photo I'm not surprised they were bored or crying by the end.
Why did you need a perfect photo rather than a natural one?
Refusing to send photos and deleting them is really childish. If this is enough to ruin your night you're in for a rough time as your DD grows up.
It's not a big deal in the scheme of things

Maybe you just don’t look good in photos? However hard I or the photographer try I always look shit in photos. You might be the same without realising it.

You’re really not listening to people are you?

Get a really nice photo of you both tomorrow. Even if it's a selfie. Maybe you can even get ChatGPT to combine it with one of today's photos to get the birthday party background in it.

Many many years down the track, when today's drama is long forgotten, you (and after you, your DC) will still have that lovely photo to enjoy.

One other thing, from someone old enough to have the first half of her life captured on film rather than digitally - those photos of yourself that you hated? You'll look back when you're old and think how great you looked. Don't delete them all!

I think this might be the most self-centred post I’ve seen on here. It also comes across like OP is not just resentful of the guests, but her own baby.

I get you @ChubbyBoobs456
The first year is so hard, you made it and you just wNt some pics to capture the special day. Get someone to take some pics of you and your bub with a cupcake and have a nice pic to remember. You probably put a lot of energy into the day itself and that likely didn't help. In future just ask for pics of you and bub/family to be taken first. Better yet, hire a pro to do it.
FWIW I've got pics of the day AND the next because baby was obv tired and pics weren't working, so I dressed baby up again with a few prezzies the next day.

I think possibly what some people are missing is that there were photos of OP, she just didn’t like how she looked in them.

And as revenge for that, she’s now withholding photos of her baby with other family members.

I’m sorry, but I do think it’s pretty spiteful.

I understand the desire to have photos, I really do. And yes, as mothers we’re often the ones who feature least in photos, for various reasons.

I think if no one took any photos of OP with her baby, OP could reasonably be upset. But that’s not the case.

I think @DarklingIlisten nailed it when she said that OP carefully curates her photos - but that’s impossible to do when you’re trying to have a photo taken with babies/children!

My DC are both autistic and they know I like a photo with them on their birthday. They hate it but indulge me. But it’s one and done. DP takes the shot and it is what it is 😂🫣 It’s rarely flattering but it’s me with my DC. And that’s honestly enough.

OP, you can take a lovely flattering selfie with your baby another day. Look back at your photos tomorrow and see if you can’t see them for what they are: a lovely moment captured at your child’s birthday. People take photos differently - some people literally point and snap rather than spending ages setting up the shot as you’d want.

You say some of the photos of you aren’t acceptable because you’re talking or DD isn’t looking directly at the camera. I think they sound lovely and natural!